Engineering students’ attitudinal beliefs by gender and student division: a methodological comparison of changes over time

Abstract

Background Students’ attitudinal beliefs related to how they see themselves in STEM have been a focal point of recent research, given their well-documented links to retention and persistence. These beliefs are most often assessed cross-sectionally, and as such, we lack a thorough understanding of how they may fluctuate over time. Using matched survey responses from undergraduate engineering students (n = 278), we evaluate if, and to what extent, students’ engineering attitudinal beliefs (attainment value, utility value, self-efficacy, interest, and identity) change over a 1-year period. Further, we examine whether there are differences based on gender and student division, and then compare results between cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses to illustrate weaknesses in our current understanding of these constructs. Results Our study revealed inconsistencies between cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses of the same dataset. Cross-sectional analyses indicated a significant difference by student division for engineering utility value and engineering interest, but no significant differences by gender for any variable. However, longitudinal analyses revealed statistically significant decreases in engineering utility value, engineering self-efficacy, and engineering interest for lower division students and significant decreases in engineering attainment value for upper division students over a one-year period. Further, longitudinal analyses revealed a gender gap in engineering self-efficacy for upper division students, where men reported higher means than women. Conclusions Our analyses make several contributions. First, we explore attitudinal differences by student division not previously documented. Second, by comparing across methodologies, we illustrate that different conclusions can be drawn from the same data. Since the literature around these variables is largely cross-sectional, our understanding of students’ engineering attitudes is limited. Our longitudinal analyses show variation in engineering attitudinal beliefs that are obscured when data is only examined cross-sectionally. These analyses revealed an overall downward trend within students for all beliefs that changed significantly—losses which may foreshadow attrition out of engineering. These findings provide an opportunity to introduce targeted interventions to build engineering utility value, engineering self-efficacy, and engineering interest for student groups whose means were lower than average.

Self-efficacy and belonging: the impact of a university makerspace

“…These effect sizes, which indicate standardized mean differences in each factor between timepoints, are not only quite large by statistical standards (Cohen 2013), but also occurred across only a one semester time period. Further, the fact that students are showing gains in these metrics at all stands in stark contrast to prior longitudinal research which show engineering attitudes, such as self-efficacy, typically decreases over time (Andrews et al 2021;Jones et al 2010). This indicates that completing a course project in a makerspace, no matter how small, could potentially counteract the drop in self-efficacy typical for engineering undergraduate students.…”

“…Fourth-year students reported statistically significantly higher levels of design self-efficacy than first-and second-year students. This result is not surprising, as upper-division students have likely had more exposure to the design process and are typically enrolled in courses with more complex, design-focused course projects, such as capstone design; still it contradicts research that finds engineering self-efficacy beliefs decrease over time (Andrews et al 2021;Jones et al 2010). Descriptively, these cross-sectional results indicate growth in design self-efficacy throughout students' time as undergraduates, with the exception of first-year students, whose mean was higher than second-year students.…”

“…Specific to engineering education, domain-specific self-efficacy has been found to be a significant predictor of persistence (Bandura 1986;Brainard and Carlin 1998;Marra et al 2012;Sheppard et al 2010) and engineering career choice (Cass et al 2011;Godwin et al 2013). Further, while readers may guess that students would gain self-efficacy over time, longitudinal research has largely found that engineering self-efficacy beliefs actually decrease in undergraduates (Andrews et al 2021;Jones et al 2010).…”

HUG Initiative: Overcoming roadblocks on a research career roadmap of individuals from historically marginalized or underrepresented genders

“…Since STEM fields are often associated with masculinity (Master et al, 2016;Cheryan et al, 2017), HUG students are often perceived as being a misfit between their gendered self-concept and the image of STEM (Kessels et al, 2014). Another factor for low STEM identity is due to the low self-efficacy beliefs of HUG students, that is, they possess lower confidence in their ability to conduct a STEM project or research (Miles and Naumann, 2021;de las Cuevas et al, 2022;Andrews et al, 2021). Women in physics class have lower science self-efficacy than their men counterparts.…”

Career Plans of Latinx Mechanical Engineering Undergraduates Studying at Hispanic-Serving Institutions

“…Utility value is how useful the task is to an individual's current or long-range goals, and attainment value is the personal importance an individual places on doing well in a task (Wigfield and Eccles, 2000). Several studies, including longitudinal ones, show that more-advanced undergraduates may have less-positive attitudes toward engineering than newer students (Andrews et al, 2021;Jones et al, 2010;Matusovich et al, 2010;Robinson et al, 2019).…”